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Any Situation Can Be A Good Situation
- Alex Chen
- 14 minutes ago
- 7 min read
When the great ancient Greek philosopher Socrates was still single, he shared a small room, which was barely eight square meters, with a few friends. Life was cramped and inconvenient, yet he was always cheerful and smiling.
Someone asked him, “With so many people squeezed together, it must be hard to even turn around. What’s there to be so happy about?”
(Pause. How do you think Socrates responded?)
Socrates replied, “When friends live together, we can exchange ideas and share our feelings anytime. Isn’t that something to be happy about?”
Later, one by one, his friends got married and moved out. Socrates was left alone in the room, but he remained just as content.
(Pause. Why do you think Socrates was still happy?)
He said, “I have so many books! Each book is a teacher. To be surrounded by so many teachers and to be able to learn from them anytime—how could I not be happy?”
A few years later, Socrates got married and moved into a seven-story building. His home was on the ground floor, the worst location in the building. People upstairs often dumped dirty water, threw down dead rats, old shoes, and all kinds of trash. Yet Socrates still appeared cheerful and at ease.
Someone asked curiously, “You live in such a place and still feel happy?”
(Pause. How do you think Socrates responded?)
Socrates said, “Of course! Do you know how many advantages there are to living on the first floor? For example, I can step inside as soon as I open the door—no need to climb stairs. Moving things is easy and effortless. When friends visit, they don’t have to knock on doors floor by floor to find me. And what pleases me most is that I can plant clusters of flowers and rows of vegetables right outside. The joy from that is endless!”
A year later, Socrates gave his first-floor room to a friend who had an elderly relative with limited mobility. He moved to the seventh floor—the top of the building. Yet again, he remained cheerful as ever.
Someone asked teasingly, “Sir, are there many benefits to living on the seventh floor too?”
(Pause. How do you think Socrates responded?)
Socrates smiled and said, “Of course there are! For one thing, going up and down the stairs several times a day is great exercise and good for my health. The lighting is excellent, so reading and writing don’t strain my eyes. No one lives above me, so it’s peaceful day and night.”
Later, that same person met Plato, one of Socrates’ students, and said, “Your teacher is always so happy, but I really don’t think the places he’s lived in were that great.”
Plato replied,
“A person’s happiness doesn’t depend on their surroundings, but on their state of mind.”
My Experience
Everyone wants to be happy, but most people think that in order to be happy, the outside world needs to be a certain way. That's a certain mindset for suffering because the outside world often is not the way people want it to be. The good news is, we can learn to adjust our thinking and mindset so that no matter what the outside situation is, we can maintain our peace and happiness, just like Socrates.
In my experience, I've found three ways to reframe any situation into a good situation:
Find the good
Focus on improving ourselves from it
Focus on setting a good example for others
1: Find the good
When something bad happens, we often zoom in on the bad. But chances are, there are also good aspects to the situation too. We just have to jump out of the negativity hole and look for the good.
For example, recently I went to visit the doctor's office, and the doctor was late by 30 minutes, and I was 14th in line. I was getting a bit annoyed that they didn't open on time, and that I had to wait in line for so long. What could be good about this? Well, I could be grateful that I have free healthcare, that I don't have any serious illness (a lot of the other people in line seemed to be less healthy comparatively), that I have the time to wait, and that I can still do work on my phone while I wait. So that's exactly what I did, and I felt pleased that I was able to remain calm and make good use of the unexpected inconvenience.
2: Focus on improving ourselves from it
Socrates once said,
"Just as one person delights in improving his farm, and another his horse, so I delight in attending to my own improvement day by day."
It's human nature to delight in one's own growth and improvement, so rather than focusing on how the external situation is not what we wanted it to be, we can focus on how we can improve ourselves from it. If we can grow from this difficulty, then we'd feel happy and grateful for it.
For example, the doctor being late is annoying to me. Why? Well, I expect others to be on time. I don't have much to do while waiting in line, and I don't like wasting time. How could I reframe the situation so that it becomes a good thing?
Well, I could tell myself, "This is exactly what I need!" Why? Because if I want to live a happy life, I have to train my mind to view any situation as good, and that requires me to encounter challenges and practice using them. This situation is a challenge for me to let go of demands towards others and instead be tolerant and understanding towards others. Maybe the doctor had a family emergency today. Maybe the doctor was feeling sick today but still dragged himself to the office to help patients in need. It doesn't matter what the actual situation is, what I choose to believe about it determines how I feel and how I treat the doctor when I see him.
From another perspective, being late is a very common thing. I am late sometimes too. If I get really upset at others for being late, then I am basically setting myself up to be upset frequently in life. That's not other people's problem, that's my problem. So I should learn from every experience and have a back-up plan for when others are late.
When I told myself these things, I could more calmly wait in line, and I was happy that I improved my tolerance and patience from this experience.
3: Focus on setting a good example for others
We all want others to be better and advise them on their faults. But whether or not other people listen to us depends on whether we've set a good example for them. If I tell others to be more patient and tolerant, but I'm always complaining and impatient, then others will think, "Who are you to tell me to be more patient? You should fix yourself first!"
While waiting at the doctor's office, my mother was also impatient. At one point, she even asked if we should just leave and come back another day because there were so many people lined up and there was nowhere to sit. I focused on staying calm and said, "Well, we're already here, and we have time today, and the weather is only going to get worse as winter progresses, so why not just wait a bit longer? Besides, you can do your Buddha chanting meditation here. It's not that big of a difference than doing it at home, right?" She decided to listen, and we got it over with that day.
Since I myself was focused on being patient and making productive use of the situation, I was able to help my mom do the same. If I was also annoyed, I might've agreed with my mother, and we'd both just go home in a bad mood.
Later, I suggested to my mom that we visit a Chinese medicine doctor as well, and she got annoyed that I was giving her too much stuff to do, that she wants to just stay at home and finish reading a book that she's been trying to finish for a long time.
Again, I focused on cultivating my own patience and understanding, and I told her it's no rush, and she doesn't have to go see a Chinese medicine doctor if she doesn't want to. The next day, she apologized for getting annoyed when I was trying to help her with that suggestion. I then advised her and said, "The matter of going to see a Chinese medicine doctor isn't the problem. The problem is our state of mind. You could calmly say to me, 'I'm very busy trying to finish this book right now. Seeing a Chinese medicine doctor is not urgent. Can we talk about this after I'm done reading my book?"
Since she can see that I'm often trying to cultivate my calmness and patience, she was willing to accept my advice. Therefore, by focusing on improving ourselves, we naturally also set a good example for others, so that when we do advise them in the future, they are more likely to listen to us.
Conclusion
As Plato said, our happiness is not dependent on our outside circumstances, but rather on our mind and way of thinking.
We can turn negative situations around by choosing to look for the good, focus on improving ourselves, and focus on setting a good example for others. These three methods are interrelated and we can use all three at the same time.
What are some "bad" situations that you encountered recently? How could you reframe them into good situations?
Weekly Wisdom #372
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